(Part of a series: The Problems Associated with a Collectivistic Society)

The seventh problem associated with a collectivistic society is: it teaches us that nothing is our fault.

The previous six problems have primarily dealt with the financial issues that plague collectivism and socialism. Certainly, the financial aspect of socialism is what drives conservatives from it. Government control affects both monetary and social aspects of politics. While it can be good for civil rights, socialism has negative aspects in terms of social issues.

Of course our ultimate goal as a society would be to treat everyone equally, without discrimination or prejudice. However, no amount of governmental interaction can force people to be nice to each other. For this reason, socialism can never accomplish a complete erasure of discrimination socially, nor can any other governmental thought process.

Not necessarily socialism, but collectivism does teach us that nothing is the fault of the individual. Consider a modern media craze-body positivity. The activists will tell us that the problem is society’s construct as to what “beautiful” is, and to a certain extent, that is true. Photoshop has made unrealistic expectations about what people should look like. But the rebuttal to this is just as bad. “You are beautiful the way you are” is saying “Don’t make positive changes”. Blaming society as a justification for lack of exercise and poor eating habits takes the weight away from the individual, and places it on the community. People are responsible for their own actions. No, it is not society’s fault that you don’t feel beautiful; you are your own person. You can personally make a choice to eat better and exercise; that way, it will be on you to make yourself feel better, not society. It’s not their responsibility, because they should be focusing on making themselves the best they can. Who has time to take care of themselves as well as care about how everyone else feels? Pardon the insensitivity, but the real world is far from a Disney movie. It’s simply not the responsibility of society to make every person feel thin and beautiful, when saying that would be a lie. Not everyone is thin, and that’s perfectly acceptable. But lying to people about how they look is not positive.

In association with the concept of “many hands make light work”, if each individual realized that they carry a specific weight in a society, and executed said weighted responsibility, that society would thrive. But placing a greater emphasis on the group and ignoring the individuals that compose it, leads to its ruin. We blame society for our problems, but we are society. It is time for individuals to make individual changes rather than wait for the impossible change in group dynamics. Individuals can lead groups of people to societal changes, but until the individual realizes that they carry a responsibility, no change can occur.

We are individuals. We are independent. We compose societies. But let us not forget, that within this collectivistic composition that we carry weight. We are not dependent on others to carry our weights for us. We labor, we sow, and we reap. We don’t relinquish our uniqueness for some greater gain, because we know that being individual in our own uniqueness is a far greater gain than anything a collectivistic society could promise us.

It shouldn’t be a requirement of this analysis to show why collectivistic socialists are selfish. But a logically devoid, bandwagoning class of individuals perhaps require such a statement. Wealth redistribution is the socialist’s platform, and as other sections of this series have denoted the unsustainability, dependency and idiocy of this concept, what should be disturbing to most about collectivism is how completely unjust it is.

For a moment, forget what it teaches us about work, forget how soon the money will run out, but think solely on taking the possessions of others against their will. The Bible (and most morally awake humans) refers to this as stealing, and between individuals it is prohibited. But when the government wants to tax the rich at a much higher rate, simply for the reason of “they are rich” and then gives that money to the poor, the name changes from “theft” to “collectivism”.

The concept of “robbing the rich and giving to the poor” has been in circulation since 13th century England made the folklore of Robin Hood famous. This RobinHoodonomics works well on paper and in fantasy- perhaps that is why Robin Hood is folklore, and not a politician. And it should also be pointed out that in many Robin Hood tales, the poor that Robin Hood was redistributing money to were taxed by the king at a very high rate. So Robin Hood could have completely abandoned his job as a wealth redistributor and perhaps honed his already immaculate archer skills, if the government would just turn the taxes on low, which is the opposite of the socialist platform. Perhaps instead of giving money back to the poor, the government could just not take their money in the first place.

What is admirable about Robin Hood is he was quite blatant in his theft, something socialist governments try to mask now with words like progressivism, redistribution, and of course, collectivism. How can any moral person truly say they are for “robbing”, the first word of Robin Hood’s campaign? Are we to treat the rich with a different moral code? Perhaps a code that does not include robbery and theft? Of course not! Saying “they won’t miss it because they have so much” does not address the issue of theft. Robbery is not justified when the party being robbed doesn’t miss the taken items. Theft is still wrong.

Theft is selfish. The simplest of concepts, it can be difficult to express in words how to get the message across to people that taking something that someone else worked for, at no cost to you, is selfish! We are often taught this in kindergarten. Work for what you want. Leave what you have not worked for.

(Part of a series: The Problems Associated with a Collectivistic Society)

The fifth problem associated with a collectivistic society is: it allows for more governmental takeover.

It’s the highest level of a political insult- something that artsy folk feel particularly empowered by shouting to conservatives, comparing any social policy or politician to the Chancellor that held office between 1933 and 1945, Mr. Adolf Hitler. Conservatives find it particularly amusing when liberals assert their policies Hitleresque because Hitler was himself a socialist. While it is insulting to anyone of any party to be compared to such a hateful man, (liberals compare conservatives to Hitler because they think that, like Hitler, conservatives are for this “Aryan” perfection in social society. Today they refer to it as “White Privilege”) liberals forget how Hitler rose to power.

“To conquer a nation, first disarm its citizens”-Adolf Hitler

“Let me control the textbooks, and I will control the state”-Adolf Hitler

Hitler had a terribly racist, bigoted agenda (again why he’s associated with conservatives), but he accomplished this agenda with the core concept of liberalism: more government takeover. Hitler was a fascist at his core, but he could only achieve true fascism by masking his exterior with socialism. When a people willingly surrender their rights and freedoms to naively acquire an alleged financial gain, their government can control them like puppets. Socialists tell us that the government can do a better job at taking care of their citizens than the citizens could accomplish on their own. At the appeal of free money, education, and healthcare, the citizens fall into the trap, and the government now has control of a people. If history is any indication of this repetition, look directly to the manner in which the American government “took care of” the Native Americans.

Of course it would be naïve to compare Nazi Germany with that of socialist America, Britain, or any other modern socialist society. But a gradient exists, and capitalism is currently the system that is furthest from government takeover. Socialism is not neighbors with communism and fascism, but it certainly resides closer to them than capitalism does. Once we as a society have decided to move the general direction of government takeover by simply meeting them halfway with socialism, we automatically give them more power to take us all the way to communism and fascism. We should make it as difficult as possible for the government to take control of society.

Even a government agenda with the best intentions cannot outrank the freedom of individuals to run their own lives. How can a government in charge of the most diverse nation in the world think that one plan is best for everyone? If we are to truly celebrate our diversity as an eclectic country, let us not allow for a government that plans to equalize finances and circumstances. We are unique, we are individuals, and we are capitalists.

(Part of a series: The Problems Associated with a Collectivistic Society)

The fourth problem associated with a collectivistic society is: it creates an environment of dependency.

The moment we begin to think that the solution to our financial problems lies within the bank accounts of those wealthier than us, we’ve immediately become dependent on said rich person. Money talks, and if socialists profess that we as the middle class need to wrestle power away from the billionaire class, why give the billionaire class more power by being dependent on their money? As well as fostering an environment of dependency, socialism fosters an environment of hate-which is interesting considering the “Stop Hate” picket signs that democrats carry. The middle class says they hate the billionaire class, and because of that they want to take their money away from them and use it to fund their own lives. In response to this, the billionaires have hatred for those who want to take their money. If we truly want to end hatred, we should learn to live our lives independently of anyone else. Being dependent on someone gives them power over you, and a power imbalance creates hate.

Power imbalances aside, the reason socialism fosters an environment of dependency is obvious: people are living off of other people’s labor.

For the sake of simplicity, a scenario we shall concoct: Trisha and Ann are planning a party. Trisha assumes that Ann will be responsible for bringing the jam to go on the bread because Ann lives on a berry farm. Ann assumes that Trisha will be responsible for bringing the jam because Trisha has often supplied similar condiments in previous engagements. Upon commencement of the party, Ann and Trisha find themselves without any jam. Their dependency on each other to carry the responsibility fell through, because each party involved had 100% confidence in the other’s capabilities an responsibilities while having 0% of logic or drive to carry out the responsibility themselves.

Working together and sharing can be a very good thing, in fact children are often taught sharing at a very young age- socialists love to proclaim this and their slogan even reads: “Socialism: the radical idea of sharing”. However, the politics of running a kindergarten classroom where Jimmy has taken all the toys away from Ellen, are vastly different from the politics of a country where Ellen thinks she’s entitled to Jimmy’s income. You see, in kindergarten, we don’t work for our toys, but in life we do work for our money. Therefore, goods and possessions that people own cannot be simplified to the “radical idea of sharing” because if the labor was unequal, the outcome was unequal and an equalization of this would mean that someone was getting robbed of their labor.

For those who are poor enough that they don’t know where their next meal is coming from, a billionaire seems lavishly frivolous. Their wealth is so incomprehensible, that the poor see it as “they won’t even notice the chip removed from it”. Perhaps this may be true, but upon multiplication of these financial parasites, their wealth will begin to noticeably deteriorate. The rich only remain rich because of frugality. If their seemingly “endless” wealth were redistributed evenly among those who weren’t as blessed, their wealth would be gone, and no one would be rich; the apparent dream of socialists. “If I cannot be rich, no one can”. In strong discordance with the dream of capitalists, “If all people work hard, all can be rich”

The paradigm must be switched 180 degrees. Sustainable capital does not come from others who labor, but from laboring yourself.

(Part of a series: The Problems Associated with a Collectivistic Society)

The third problem associated with a collectivistic society is: it’s not sustainable.

Briefly touched on in the previous problem statement, the way that collectivistic socialists choose to handle financial matters of government is simply not sustainable. This is an extension of Margaret Thatcher’s famous quote “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people’s money”. No conversation with a socialist would be complete until they brought up the wage gap. Asserting its unjust nature in that some are allowed to become wealthier than others, socialists are appalled by the lack of equality. A worthy argument in terms of social issues, but government-controlled complete income equality is employed in North Korea- a place that doesn’t receive high numbers of tourists or immigrants.

The problem with leavening the wage gap is that in pulling the wealthy down to meet the poor, the poor people’s source of income is coming from something other than labor. Supporting the poor with income from the wealthy sounds empowering, good-Samaritan-like and, just. But a question that socialists have trouble answering is “what do you plan to do after the wealthy are no longer wealthy?” The answer that most come up with is “the money that is redistributed will be used to get the poor back on their feet so they can get labor as their sustainable income”- good in words, but unrealistic in practice. Is that not the exact same concept that welfare was founded on? Now tell me, how does welfare still exist if its recipients are using the money to get off of welfare? Since the class receiving money isn’t draining, the class donating money is being emptied of their wealth and slowly being added to the same pile- a pile of laborless fools. An excellent extrapolation of socialism would be everyone in a specific country being associated with welfare. A line exists, and if the citizens’ income is above said line, they donate to the citizens whose income is below the line. The socialists love the line, because it equalizes all incomes. But because of its unsustainability, the threshold of who pays and who receives would decrease-yes, it would decrease at the same rate, no wage gap- but still it would decrease.

Ponder it scholastically. An equalization of the grade gap would only cause the threshold to decrease. Currently, teachers employ a capitalist grading system that allows for individual students studying to be tied proportionally to the grade they receive on homework or tests. Socialistic classrooms would average the grades, which perhaps would not be terrible grades to begin with. Say the first test average was an 87% B+. Most would be happy with this grade. But those who weren’t happy with the grade could do nothing to raise it because the proportionally tied studying:grade ratio has been tampered with. No amount of endless drilling, flash cards, or all-nighters would make their grade any higher because they would be limited by those who were doing poorly in the class, of their own individual decisions. After the realization that no amount of studying could salvage their grade, the A students would no longer study for A’s , they would study for B’s, because as long as D’s are averaged in, no A’s could be yielded. But, in the previous average, the students who studied for the A held the average as high as it was. When those above the average come down to meet the average, the entire average goes down because we know those below the average won’t put any more effort in because they are having the system worked in their favor. In this particular situation, we could expect the average to go down until the entire class was receiving failing grades, waiting for everyone else to study for an above average grade.

The concept of averaging works excellently at the beginning, but with time, it only hurts everyone involved.

(Part of a series: The Problems Associated with a Collectivistic Society)

The second problem associated with a collectivistic society is: it fosters an environment of laziness

As insensitive as it sounds to the “Labour” party in Britain, whose proclaimed platform of being for those who work didn’t really create jobs under James Callaghan’s socialist government in the Winter of Discontent in 1978, collectivistic governments don’t place a heavy emphasis on working individuals. At least the piles of rubbish collecting on British streets while the garbage men sat on strike waiting for the government to give them a raise didn’t really seem to say “strong labouring force”. What gave those garbage men the ability to demand such unrealistic pay raises? Why couldn’t they simply work the corporate ladder to their own advantage? The answer to both is an emphasis on collectivism rather than individualism. When we think of society as consisting of groups rather than individuals, we erase the fire within individuals to strive for more. Five months after the Winter of Discontent, Britain elected their first and only female Prime Minister. At that time in the late 70’s, the status of women was not high, and collectively, they could not achieve a political position as high as prime minister, but through Margaret Thatcher’s strong drive and individualism, she won the position. So collectively, the garbage men decided that they wanted to strike to see if the government would grant their frivolous request. Even though the status of garbage men was as low as the status of women, one woman threw off the chains of her collectivism and won the highest position in the country, while the garbage men only succeeded in making the Winter of Discontent more miserable for everyone in England. Margaret Thatcher did not win the election though a labour union, she won it through the individualism of her femininity.

Shortly before Margaret’s resignation in November of 1990, a question in a Parliament session was directed toward her by the leader of the socialist opposition: “…During her years as prime minister, the gap between the richest 10% and the poorest 10% has widened substantially…Certainly that is not something that she can be proud of”. Socialists possess an undying hatred for the richest 10%, which is interesting considering the fuel for their socialist policies comes from a high taxation of this very income bracket. Why would you hate your fuel? Don’t bite the hand that feeds you. In hatred of this income bracket, the socialists are set on bringing the billionaires down to the level of the middle class- you know, misery loves company. Besides the clear unsustainability of this system, the system supports laziness. Under capitalism, capital is a direct result of labor, while under socialism; capital is a direct result of taxing the rich. Taxing the rich doesn’t require work on the end of the recipient. Thus, socialism fosters an environment of laziness. Margaret Thatcher’s response to this socialist is thrilling: “What the honorable member is saying is that he would rather the poor were poorer provided the rich were less rich! You do not create wealth and opportunity that way; you do not create a property-owning democracy that way!”

Not all socialists are lazy. Not all capitalists are hard workers. But the general environment of socialism is one that says “society will do the work” but do socialists realize that we are society? One must work if one wants money. Any revisions to this system are simply, lazy.

(Part of a series: The Problems Associated with a Collectivistic Society)

Any one of the world’s societies- which come from a vastly diverse palette- from those as suffocating as communist North Korea, to those whose government only have their thumb lightly placed on their country’s jugular as the socialist programs that pervade capitalist America, share a common characteristic: collectivism. No country or society is completely free from it, even though the amount of collectivism that is allowed to diffuse into each government is vastly different according to each time and place. Yes, no society is free from it, so a socialist takeover is imminent in every society. The line between complete freedom and complete takeover exists; it is simply up the each society or country to determine where the line should be moved-in which direction, and how far.

The first problem associated with a collectivistic society: it’s enticing.

In terms of moving the line closer to communism, no level-headed person could truly want a communistic government (unless of course, they are the ruler of it). But the things that entice voters to collectivism, free education, free healthcare, a smaller gap between the rich and the poor, all require moving the line closer to a complete government takeover. Few realize this, and after hearing “I will make education free” in a Sanders speech, have vowed to vote for him and his collectivistic ways-no matter what the cost. When taxes increase to 60%, yes education will be free, but how much money are you truly saving? You have less money to begin with, because the government has taken a majority of it. Because the allure is strong, few realize the perniciousness of collectivism and thusly, the demographic of its voters tend to be economically ignorant and inferior.

Of course free education sounds enticing to students. Of course free healthcare sounds enticing to citizens. But what is free, really? Any free good or service comes at a loss to at least one party involved. When one notices a free sign at a store, they don’t think twice about it, because the store is at a loss. They paid for the item from their supplier, and in giving it to customers without a charge, they lose money. It’s very simple. Free education doesn’t mean that teachers will teach for free. Free healthcare doesn’t mean that doctors will work for free. It means that someone will be at a loss. And socialists are willing to put the US economy at a loss if it means that they can get free education in return. In transferring the burden of paying for college and healthcare from individuals to society, we all become responsible for the problems of individuals. When a consumer expends capital, he usually gets (and wants) some kind of physical good or service from it. When citizens’ tax rates go through the roof to fund college student’s education, what do they get in return? Free college is not free. It comes simply from shifting responsibilities that should be on individuals, to society- something that is simply not their responsibility.

Socialist politicians think they are doing good things. Socialist voters think that they advocating for positive change. But under collectivism, many good citizens are negatively affected.

Late in May the FDA released a newly revised nutrition facts label. The new label shows the calories in a much larger bolder font, the FDA’s apparent “contribution” to the American obesity epidemic. Truly, do you think that morbidly obese individuals care about the amount of calories in a serving size of ice cream? Forget caring about calories, fat people generally don’t even look at the nutrition facts, much less measuring out a serving size.

And of course, “fat people generally don’t even look at the calories” is the point of the entire revision. Perhaps pointing out the fact in more bolded letters will cause people to rethink consuming 230 calories in ice cream. It might. It’s worth a shot. But if someone-fat or thin-wants to eat ice cream, bigger bolder numbers aren’t going to stop them.

While it’s one way to target the problem, I should think that picking off the leaves of a weed doesn’t truly solve the problem. Ripping the weed out by the roots leads to a more permanent fix. What obese people lack is self-control. Thin people often eat ice cream and other bad foods-foods that have the exact same amount of calories and the calories were advertised on the box in the exact same font. It’s not the size of the calories that is the problem; the problem is a lack of self-control on the part of the individual.

Now, how does one go about tampering with the lives of individuals to try and change their lifestyle to match their own? By being a liberal of course! Not everyone possesses the willpower to want to be thin. Some people don’t even want to be thin. Talks about heath, longevity and disease risk aren’t going to change some people. America is a country of freedom-it’s what we were founded on, and if leaders believed in it today, our problems as a country would be much less.

As a pessimist, I don’t see how enlarging the size of the calories will do much for people who don’t care about calories. It may, but don’t count on it. As an individualist, I feel that every American has the right to decide what and how much food they put into their bodies. As for the liberals, it’s simply not their place to be telling other individuals how to live their lives.

Like serious hate. Several events led to my conversion and they are as follows.

1) Anyone who has dislike or hate for Donald Trump should seriously consider if they personally dislike the man, or if they are taking the twisted truth about him that the liberal media spoons feeds us. One of the bigger concepts in my conversion, I realized that the media would NEVER paint Donald Trump in a good light, no matter what he did, so I would have to start doing my own research. Best idea ever. For any candidate- don’t take the media’s word for it. If the candidate is a liberal, know that the media is head-over-heels in love with them, and is prepared to not report anything negative about them; perhaps in exchange for some oral sex- oh wait, that’s liberal presidents with their interns, I apologize. If the candidate is conservative, know that the media hates them in every way and is prepared to Photoshop their face on monkey (http://www.obamaconspiracy.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/image28.png) So of course the media shows you the terrible things that Trump has said, perhaps out of context, and no conservative tries to justify the fact that yes, Donald Trump has said some awful things. But if we worked the system equally, as democrats love to proclaim, you’d hear just as many terrible things that have come spewing from the mouth of the Benghazi Queen, and it’s not because she doesn’t say terrible things- she does, the media just doesn’t report them because they love her and are prepared to push their own agenda in who they wish to elect this November. Politically speaking, I take everything the media says about candidates with a grain of salt.

2) Trump has no tact, and even as his supporter, I know that. It was one of the qualities about him that turned me off in the first place, and I classified his actions as “childish”. But after the realization that EVERY candidate this election is childish, that no longer became an issue. If I wanted a mature president, I’d need a time machine back to the 80’s. But for 2016, I’d either have a childish billionaire, a woman who childishly covered up several scandals, or a 74 year old child that thinks other children’s toys belong to him without having to work for it.

3) I decided that I’m more loyal to my party than I am to a specific person. By the time the primaries had come to my home state of Wisconsin, there were only 3 republican candidates left. I liked Kasich and Cruz better than Trump, but I knew for a fact, that neither one was strong enough to win the nomination, or be strong enough to overtake the democrats in November. I figured a vote for a weak republican was equal to a vote for a democrat. If I wasn’t fueling the man who was the only clear option for defeating Killary or a socialist, I was just supporting Killary or the socialist.

As time progressed I realized that the wall was not racist, but rather a necessary operation that only hypocrites were against. Mexico is extremely strict on illegal immigration and accepts few immigrants from Guatemala on their southern border. Of course all immigrants just want a better life for their families, but Mexico doesn’t have ample credibility on the issue. Vast other countries are extremely strict on immigration policies, yet only the United States gets criticized.

And I realized that in idolizing the decades of the 50’s and the 80’s (which coincidentally, both had conservative presidents for the majority of their 10 years), I did know that America was once great, and the liberals had messed it up. I was ready to make America great again.

For the life of me, I’ll never be able to understand liberals’ obsession with animals. Clearly it’s not an obsession with life; otherwise their position on abortion would be radically different. But there’s something inherently different about life that has four limbs and a fur-covered body that liberals have somehow deemed more important than humans. All the “save the animals!” picket signs, the outrage over someone accidentally shooting a lion that apparently people had an emotional attachment to because it had a name, and the recent outrage, the fact that the zoo that shot Harambe the gorilla to protect the life of a child.

Yes, she was being a bad parent. But who are people to judge? Especially liberals, many of which who don’t have children themselves because they’ve aborted them all. Perhaps she was tending to another child who had run off, and she didn’t know about the other child being dangerously close to the side of the gorilla pit. The fact remains; the people outraging over the issue don’t know the entire circumstances of the situation and don’t have experience running a zoo.

I’d also LOVE to touch on this particular part of the story (when I heard it, I was happier than I was than when I had heard that Donald Trump had reached 1237). After the incident, Twitter was abuzz with people that somehow managed to bring race into the issue. Some examples included:

“So this gorilla was taken from its homeland, put in captivity, and then shot to preserve white people. That sounds familiar”

“If the kid who fell into the pit was black, they wouldn’t have shot the gorilla.”

Turns out, THE KID WHO FELL IN THE PIT WAS BLACK!

Oh I literally cannot contain my joy! Not joy that a child of any color fell into a gorilla pit, but JOY THAT LIBERALS ARE THE STUPIDEST, MOST UNINFORMED IDIOTS THAT EXIST!

The glee. I just can’t. Do your research before you outrage, brainless retards.

Of course this situation could have been avoided if the parents had been paying a little more attention. But what would have made the situation worse? SAYING THAT ANIMAL LIFE IS MORE IMPORTANT THAT HUMAN LIFE AND LETTING A CHILD DIE INSTEAD OF A DAMN GORILLA. I can’t believe it has to be said- yes, humans are more important than animals.

Don’t judge peoples’ parenting skills when you weren’t there. Don’t judge zookeeper skills when you’re not a zookeeper. Don’t assume that zookeepers only want to protect white children. Do your research before freaking out. And of course, know that humans are more important than animals.